Welcome to SDEE

Welcome to San Diego Entrepreneurs Exchange!

The San Diego Entrepreneurs Exchange (SDEE) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization run by local entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs and pre-entrepreneurs interested in Life Sciences, Biotech, Pharma, Medical Devices, Tech and Alternative Energy. SDEE was founded to provide a voice and resources for early stage startups, to encourage new entrepreneurs, and sponsor networking and educational services to help develop skills necessary to bring new businesses and funding to the San Diego area.

Please join your fellow SDEE members for our 2016 Annual Year-end Social! It will be a great evening of networking, fantastic food, craft beer and wine, and good conversations!

We will continue our tradition of the 4th Annual Opportunity Drawing! Tickets for the drawing will be available at the door - cash, credit card, and debit cards are accepted. You must purchase tickets to participate. The prizes range from Amazon Echos, Bernardo Winery wine tasting tickets, a New English Brewing Co. growler, Green Acre/Farmer and Seahorse $100 gift cards, a Bristol Farms gift basket, a 1 month membership at HeraHub, a 2 month Muay Thai membership at King Tiger, $1,000 in equipment from member company American Laboratory Trading, live assay kits from member companies Montana Molecular and Biopioneer, a Vortex from member company Sustainable Surplus Exchange, a Zumbar Coffee $25 gift certificate and 1lb of coffee, an Executive Photo Portrait from member company Hansen Photo Inc., 3 bottles of wine from member Michael Klein, golf for 2 at Emerald Isle Gold Course, and more! If you would like to embrace the holiday spirit and to donate a drawing item, please contact Danielle Hayes at dhayes@sdentrepreneurs.org.

This exclusive event is free for our members, sponsors and speakers, but you do need to RSVP to reserve your space. Your guests are welcome to attend, please purchase guest tickets ($35/guest) at the link below.

Congratulations to ALT Lab Equipment San Diego on their recent expansion to a 14,000 sq ft site at 6444 Nancy Ridge Dr! ALT is a great resource for local biotech startups looking for affordable refurbished lab equipment. Check out this article for more details. Want to see the facility and meet the staff? Join the ALT launch party and ribbon cutting November 30 at 4-6:30 pm.

Congratulations to SDEE member, CureMatch, for being named one of Xconomy's 12 San Diego tech startups to follow in 2017! CureMatch Inc. is a startup company founded in 2015 and currently incubating at JLABS San Diego. They have developed a "decision support software platform" to assist physicians in selecting the optimal treatment for cancer patients. The program provides a personalized medicine approach to cancer patient therapeutics.

International Federation for Adipose Therapeutics and Science 2016 Conference Highlights
by Neil Thompson
Fat to the face: My time at IFATS 2016
Why would you want to put fat in your face?
That’s the question I asked myself before attending the International Federation for Adipose Therapeutics and Science (IFATS) 2016 annual meeting. I don’t know too much about fat except that most of us would rather have less of it. Held from November 17-20, clinicians, researchers, and industry folk all gathered in San Diego at the Westin San Diego Gaslamp Quarter. I was among them, and I was excited to be there.
For decades, most cosmetic surgeries were carried out with non-biological fillers. Plump up your face? Eliminate dimples on your thigh? Fillers fit the bill. The problem with them? They don’t stick around. Up to 60% of volume is lost with these types of fillers. Fat became the solution. In fat, more and more study has focused on using fat from liposuction to address filling those problem areas. The fatty material removed from the body during liposuction, called lipoaspirate, was historically seen as waste and thrown away. No more. Surgeons are now separating the fat tissue from lipoaspirate through various means, like centrifugation and simple decanting, to access the stem cells residing in the tissue. Stem cells have the ability to transform, given the correct cues, into fat cells. The stem cells can then be reinjected into problem areas so that the stem cells attract cytokines that turn the stem cells into fat cells.
Many companies, some of which were exhibitors at the meeting, are working on methods to better separate the fat tissue from lipoaspirate while increasing the yield and viability of the isolated stem cells. Results are promising. Companies like Tissue Genesis and LifeCell are developing these fat-isolating technologies. LifeCell in particular has launched a product, the REVOLVE™ System, which looks like a salad spinner. It operates by gently spinning around lipoaspirate to separate the fat tissue from blood cells, debris, and extraneous fluid. The entire process takes about 90 minutes and produces more viable stem cells than decanting alone. Another company, Andrews Technologies, showcased HydraSolve®, which uses a specially made cannula to liquefy fat with warm pressurized saline. Fat sucked into the cannula comes in contact with warm saline circulating within the cannula, which liquefies the fat. The cell viability within the aspirated fat is higher than in other traditional fat harvesting techniques.
Want to avoid liposuction and only want to fix a tiny problem area? MTF has a product, Renuva™, which can do just that. Made of allograft fat tissue (i.e. other people’s fat), Renuva is an injectable off the shelf product, eliminating the need for fat harvesting by liposuction. A competitor product, Allofill™ by Biologica Technologies, also exhibited at the meeting.
In addition to companies showing their wares, researchers also presented their work. Ever heard of microneedling? Me neither. The microneedler looks like a small rolling pin with tiny needles protruding from it. Researchers from Turkey’s Koc University School of Medicine found that rolling the microneedler over the problem area prior to fat injection increased vascularity and led to quicker engraftment of the injected fat. Oxysterol was a new term for me, too. A derivative of cholesterol, researchers at UCLA showed a link between oxysterol treatment and decrease in weight. They are looking into developing oxysterol treatments to prevent obesity. Research out of the University of Louisville is experimenting with developing cell-encapsulating spheroids. The team is 3D printing hydrophilic dots onto hydrophobic surfaces to create the spheroids. A 3D morphology of the cell-binding surface has been shown to be quite influential in maintaining the in vivo characteristics of cells. Cells plated on a flat surface typically don’t behave like cells found in the body.
The major takeaway from the meeting is that there’s no gold standard for isolating fat from lipoaspirate. Some swear by liposuction followed by allowing the fat layer to separate from the blood cell-laden liquid. Others advocate for gently spinning or centrifuging the lipoaspirate. In the next few years, I suspect more study will reveal the optimal method to get at the fat tissue’s stem cells and that method will be widely adopted. Barring prohibitive costs, of course.
So why would you want to put fat in your face? Because it works! Besides, we put Botox in our faces. Why not add some fat to the mix?

SDEE was recently treated to a tour of the new BioLabs San Diego coworking and wet lab facility for life science startups. San Diego is the newest location for BioLabs which also has facilities in Cambridge, San Francisco and North Carolina. As we toured, Susie Harborth, co-Founder and Managing Director, explained this is a 3 building complex (called GENESIS at Campus Point) featuring coworking space, a 16,000 sq ft wet lab stocked with shared equipment, conference rooms, offices and event spaces. She told us the San Diego site has a capacity to house 15-20 companies. We started in the main building which has a spacious open seating coworking area surrounded by conference rooms, private offices and the wet lab. The area is interspersed with informal spaces where co-workers can network. The star attraction is the wet lab with plenty of bench space, new equipment and an adjoining tissue culture room to be shared by BioLabs’ members. Susie mentioned that for those members needing vivarium services, Explora BioLabs is located right next door.
Susie explained that BioLabs is a membership-based, ready-to-move-in facility where startup life science companies can develop and grow. So how does the BioLabs membership work? Life Science companies can apply for a 2-year agreement with an “a la carte” use plan that includes an array of options to fit specific needs. Members can reapply after 2 years or opt out when ready to grow. Memberships start at $2000/month per bench plus a $400 per-person membership fee. As an added perk, BioCom offers a complementary membership to all BioLabs companies. BioCom is a founding partner of San Diego BioLabs. Additional amenities include an on-site lab manager, administrative assistance, Environmental Health & Safety support, centralized purchasing, shipping and more. There is even an on-site gym and swimming pool for when members need a break from their work.
BioLabs is a welcome addition to San Diego life science startup resources, helping local entrepreneurs launch, develop and grow their companies. Want to check out BioLabs for yourself? Contact Abegale Colmenar (Director of Operations) at abegale@biolabs.io to schedule a tour.

Connect with SDEE

Sign Up for SDEE Newsletter

SDEE is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization founded by local San Diego entrepreneursin order to provide a voice for the early stage start-up, to support new entrepreneurs and their companies,and to sponsor networking and educational eventsto help develop the skills necessary to bring funding, business, and jobs to the San Diego area.